Twitter welcomes @KobeBryant ... briefly

It remains to be seen when and if Kobe Bryant makes more of a real impression on Twitter, but you don't think they give out the account with the celebrity's correct name -- @KobeBryant -- to just anyone these days, do you?

That Twitter account, albeit not yet with official Twitter verification it was him, was active for a spell Wednesday night. It had been introduced and endorsed by Bryant's Facebook page and his website's Twitter account both.

With an avatar of a snake with Twitter's blue bird in its mouth and the nickname-pushing "BLACK MAMBA IS HERE" text on it, the introductory tweet to come out from @KobeBryant was: "Can you hear me now?!?!" That was before Twitter suspended the account, triggering reflexive assumptions it was all just some hack job when Bryant, in fact, is expected to maintain the active account at some point in the future.

Once Bryant is fully on Twitter, the celebrities he'll be chasing for most followers are Lady Gaga with more than 13 million and Justin Bieber with more than 12 million. Bryant's old buddy, newly retired Shaquille O'Neal, has tweeted since November 2008 and in his @SHAQ account has the most followers of any athlete with 4.27 million (just more than Lamar Odom's wife, Khloe Kardashian Odom, and her 4.26 million currently). LeBron James, who joined Twitter in March 2009 but became more active in the past year, is nearing 2.5 million followers with his @KingJames account.

Whether Bryant ever puts forth enough effort and personality via Twitter to connect with fans the way O'Neal and James have managed to -- James recently mocked his own hairline -- is the the bigger mystery for the future.

Bryant has a representative run the @KBTWOFOUR Twitter account that is an extension of his kb24.com website, and there is also the @KVBFF account for the Kobe and Vanessa Bryant Family Foundation.

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